Emraan wants to be a mass-actor

Mumbai : Riding high on the success of his recent films such as ‘The Dirty Picture', ‘Murder 2' and the recently-released ‘Jannat 2', actor Emraan Hashmi insists that rather than being called as an ‘A' list actor, he wants to be a strong mass actor.

In the recent past, Emraan has delivered several hits like ‘Once Upon a Time in Mumbai', ‘Murder 2', ‘The Dirty Picture', ‘Jannat 2' and with films with Karan Johar (untitled film), Vishal Bhardwaj (‘Ek Thi Daayan'), Rajkumar Gupta's (‘Ghanchakkar') the actor is surely on a roll.

When asked after delivering several hit movies, if he is now moving to the category of A-list of actors, Emraan says, “I never really wanted to slot myself that way.

I have always done films that I have believed in. I would rather not belong to a particular list and do films that I did, probably four-five years back, I want to do risky films, I don't want to get safer. I want to try on risky films and make them successful.”

He added that according to the trade pundits he ranked second only to Salman Khan in terms of mass appeal. “When I started with films, my intention was making the audience happy. As it is that common man who will make my film hit, their verdict is important to me.

I always go to single screen theatres to see their reaction and that is my reward. I always wanted to be a strong mass actor. I am happy that whatever movies I got to do with Vishesh Films, all have been good and fit in it well,” Emraan said.

Produced by Mukesh Bhatt, ‘Jannat 2' released last Friday, is doing good business at the box office. As per trade analysts, ‘Jannat 2' raked in Rs 24.03 crore in its opening weekend.

Talking about the success of the film, Emraan says, “I think it is important to understand that the success of a film is due to the entire team. It is a team effort. In every film of mine, whichever has been successful, it is all due to the hard work of the team from actors to director or music director to others. It will be foolish for an actor to say that a film is successful because of him.” “It is a mixed audience.

Single screens have been strong, but multiplexes have also done good business. ‘Jannat 2' has been a hit in India and even overseas,” he said. As ‘Jannat 2' is a sequel to his 2008-hit film of the same name, it seemed to be a safe bet for the makers.

“From a marketing point of view sequels do get support system. But it is important to understand that the sequels we do have strong script. In case of ‘Jannat 2' we wanted the script to be good, it was like it should be a flawless script then only make a sequel.

It was not like it is a sequel so we will cash in on it. Even if it is a sequel, like in case of ‘Raaz 3', which is in 3D, script is also strong and that is what I look for. My intention for doing a film is that the script should be good,” Emraan said.